They look pretty cool.

GMI SCUBA Wholesale owner Jim Pinson agrees with the appeal of the relatively new full-face snorkel mask. 

"One of the nice things about them, if they fit right, you can use them with a beard on and everything," he said. 

Full-face masks that cover your whole face– designed so you can breathe from both your nose and your mouth. 

"It's easier for somebody that has no experience at all. If it fits right, they can just put it on and feel it’s easier," Pinson said. "They don’t have much apprehension because they don’t have claustrophobia."  

But that very design could lead to dangerous situations. 

It’s one that master freediver instructor Farron Taijeron is all too familiar with. 

 

 

"There were a couple of tourists and they had these masks on," he said. "They were snorkeling around and something just looked off about them. One of my students said ‘Hey something looks wrong there.’ So I make my approach. I call out to them ‘Hey, are you OK?’ No response."  

He was teaching a freediving class at Ypao Beach in July when his student noticed an elderly snorkeler was unresponsive. 

"I pull off his mask to the top of his head and immediately I could see he's just gray," Taijeron said. "Not even blue, he’s just gray."

Fortunately one of his students was a nurse. And he just happened to have emergency oxygen on hand. 

"I don’t know how many people have emergency oxygen in their car at all times, but I do," he said. "So I was able to give him a brief workup while waiting for lifeguards and emergency services to come over. We got him on emergency oxygen,"

With a similar rescue just early this week as first responders pulled an unconscious woman out of Matapang waters wearing one of those masks, he’s speaking up about the potential hazards.

"If you're spending a good amount of money on this, you could expect it to be a little bit built better," Taijeron said. "And the other factor is fit. How does it fit on your face? And it has to fit in two ways. One around the face completely and one around the nose and mouth."

It's concerns experts like Pinson are backing up.

 

 

 

"If you ever want to use one of these masks, you want to try a couple of things," he said. "You want to make sure it fits. If it doesn’t fit, the problem with it is you’re rebreathing your own exhaust, your own air going out. So you’re getting CO2 back that you already blew out."

He said the masks should only be fogging around the nose. 

If it’s fogging around the eyes, it means you’re recycling CO2 which is unsafe. 

Another concern Pinson said, "Some of them when they build them, there’s what’s called flash molding. So the passages are not all the way opened up. So if you put on and feel like you have to push air in and out like you’re going through a straw, that’s dangerous too."   

His Tamuning shop doesn’t sell the full-face masks.

And he’s not the only one. 

A sudden increase of snorkel-related deaths in Hawaii back in 2018 led several companies in the Aloha State to ban these masks. 

But they’re still popular, especially for visitors. 

It’s why Taijeron is warning the public to be aware of the safety risks that come with it.

And with these points resurfacing, you may want to reconsider what snorkel gear you use the next time you enjoy the waters at the beach.